Stormy skyscape above the houses yesterday afternoon, in an interval of sun, when Dora and I went outside for our Vitamin D fix. Today the sun seems to be out for real, and I devoutly hope that the husband's plan includes lawn-mowing, because otherwise we are going to be eaten by weeds.
Today's agenda:
*I've already finished and loaded the guest post for Tuesday's Substack --- my Australian Dominican friend Fr. Robert Krishna writing on the Australian poet Kenneth Slessor
*I've already looked at some of my own poems and done a bit of tweaking, hoping to send another submission packet out soon
*dog walk, of course
*maybe some time in the garden
*reading --- I'm reading James's The Golden Bowl at the moment, and also my friend Ron Hansen's literary memoir, Hotly in Pursuit of the Real
*the husband has proposed a jaunt to Hickory for our Saturday-night/Sunday Vigil dinner, which I have heartily approved. He was gone last weekend, and in that time I had somehow managed to forget that . . . we do this. Anyway, it'll be fun to go out and have a beer.
I'm thinking again, a bit, about a dress purchase, since I do have this gift certificate burning a hole in my email inbox . . . and I'm intrigued by this Wool& dress. I like the design a lot, and the color (though I don't know how easy it would be to style in the winter), and I think it might work well for me. Considering, anyway. I don't want to rush a second new purchase for this year, because then that's it, but I think I might really wear a dress like that a lot.
And of course, as soon as I think, I don't know about wearing it in the winter, I start considering what I would wear with it:
*I think my cranberry-red cotton cardigan would look fantastic with this color and shape
*green wool-blend pullover
*green Connemara cardigan (I also think that would be a delicious combination, and would look great with my tall brown boots OR my charcoal suede Melrose boots)
*Sand Dollar tights, also my dyed Sapphire tights, possibly my dark-brown microfiber tights and bright-red tights at the holidays?
*cobalt-blue merino cardigan
*pink cardigans (merino and silk-rayon)
*beige cardigan
*light-blue rayon shrug
*cream cashmere shrug
*possibly my silk-cotton kimono
*my aqua alpaca cardigan would probably obscure the shape a good bit, but the colors would be great together
*that Thai silk kimono thing Marly talked me into buying
Okay, I have a lot that I could wear with that dress, all through the year. HMMMM. This may be what I do. I think that dress is a slightly heavier knit (more like the Sofia, which I've also been considering), which would be a good choice, I think. I like the color better than I like the Spruce Green of the Sofia, though that would certainly be a versatile color. And I like the design, with the princess seams, better as well. This may be a decision, though of course I can't do anything about it until next week at the earliest. Shall have to be PATIENT and persevere till then. I am feeling rather starved for any color that isn't purple --- otherwise I'd be more tempted by the Grace dress. If Aegean Teal were available in my size, that's probably what I'd buy, because I adore Aegean Teal (and am not really wearing my Maggie in that color, except to sleep and knock around in). The Iris Blue is beautiful, of course, but at the moment it's very much not what I want to wear more of.
I do, meanwhile, want to wear more teal. My Ocean Teal Willow is up for sale for sure, and I'm just waiting for somebody to be willing to pay what I'm asking. I've received a couple of ridiculously low-ball offers, but I think what I'm asking is reasonable for a dress in that good condition. And again, I'm just not wearing my teal Maggie so much as a real dress --- I didn't love how it looked on me in the last photos I took. This again is just part of my trend away from looser swing styles toward dresses with more structure and definition, however fluid. I realized that my chief hesitation about moving these dresses out of my regular rotation one way or another was the color --- I do love these teals. So I would like to cycle some more teal shades in, even as I cycle these particular dresses out.
That would then conclude any new buying for me, since I've counted my Iris Blue Sierra (bought at the end of December 2024) as a purchase for this year --- though I have opened up a few more secondhand slots by rotating out my jeans purchases from earlier in the year that haven't really worked (yeah, yeah, I'd love to be a jeans girl again, but I just do not love myself as a jeans girl anymore).
I'd also be paying close attention (as always) to patterns of wear, to see whether there are other things in the closet that I would really be ready to move along to other wearers.
Anyway. That's boring, but it's on my mind. Dumping it here so that I can get on with my day, and with other thoughts.
Wearing (with just-washed hair diffused about 3/4 dry):
*Wool& Sierra dress (XS) in Iris Blue, bought January 2025, last worn April 10. Wears in 2025: 18
*Secondhand Eileen Fisher merino cardigan coat, bought fall 2024, first year of wear
*Secondhand Allbirds tencel-merino leggings, bought January 2024, second year of wear
*Secondhand Birk Mayaris, bought April 2024, second year of wear
OUTFIT REPEATING IS IN. At the very least, repeating core elements of outfits is in, even when you actively don't want to be in a rut. This Sierra dress is driving down its cost-per-wear every time I put it on, and it is so easy to put on and wear, especially here at the end of Lent when I'm tired of it all. I love this dress, but also it's easier just not to think too hard about what I'm putting on. It's also a fairly tough dress, and I'm not wearing it with belts, which helps relieve the stress my frequent wears impose on it.
And with this onset of chilly-ish weather, my last-fall's cardigan-coat is getting another little outing, unexpectedly. I hadn't worn it in a while, but it's a perfect layer for a betwixt-and-between day, when temps in the morning are fairly low. It's also a great neutral to wear with this bluey purple (extremely misnamed --- it is Iris, but it's not really Blue).
Speaking of blue, I don't think I've worn these blue-gray leggings with this dress, and I find I like the combination. I think I still prefer herbal green as a neutral with purple, but on the whole, this is okay, as well as a change from a pattern I'm comfortable settling into.
As always, I'm glad that at least a large proportion of my outfit is composed of secondhand items --- that's really the story of my whole closet, though I'm also grateful to have been able to build up a nice selection of new dresses from a company with good values. What I'm wearing today really is a representation of my wardrobe overall, in multiple ways. It's a combo of new and secondhand (mostly secondhand). It's a combo of colors I reach for all the time (even when it's not Lent). It's a composite of things I wear frequently and things I wear less frequently but am still glad I own. It represents a shape and silhouette and mood I like: comfortable and easy but not careless, so that I'd really have to change outfits to go to dinner tonight. I'm grateful for all this. I chose it all, but it still feels like a gift.
It's actually the shape of this sized-down Sierra that makes me think I might try the princess-seamed Flora --- that dress is basically designed to be what I was going for in sizing down in this dress. I do like, mostly, the slimmer fit of this XS, although it's not perfect, especially across the back --- it is relaxing a lot, so this fit is much better than when I first bought it, but you can still tell that through the upper part of my back, it's a little small. I don't mind, and I'll certainly wear it happily for as long as it holds up, which I hope is years and years. But I do note that, and the more I think about it, the more I think I do want to try that Flora dress.
The thing I really like about this more fitted shape is that it feels as though it can dress up a little more than my other Sierras have ever done. I did dress up my old charcoal-gray one (my OG Sierra, my reward dress, that I eventually redyed dark green), but it always read a little "sweatshirt" to me. I like my Washed Navy one a lot, but the looser fit and the duller color make it not a dress I'd ever wear except in pretty casual circumstances. I don't think I would necessarily wear this Iris Blue dress to a wedding, but I could wear it to something kind of dressy, where I didn't mind showing a little more leg. The color is rich and pretty enough for that, and it looks nice with a drapey, silky cardigan and layered necklaces (which I'm always wearing these days in any case). And I actually like the higher neckline in a sleeveless dress. It's still fairly open and scooped, but still gives a nice amount of coverage. That's another thing that attracts me to the Flora --- I know that I wouldn't feel too exposed up top.
So, yeah, once again, singing the praises of this versatile, comfortable little dress. I am taking good care of it, so that it lasts me a long time, but I'm not babying it --- I will wear it to hike in this summer, for example. The fabric is pretty sturdy for wearing, as long as you treat it well in terms of washing and storage. So far I've washed this dress ONCE (and I've worn it now almost 20 times since January), yet it continues to smell fresh. As I do with my other knit dresses, I roll it and store it in my hanging shelf rather than hanging it, which helps keep it from stretching out too much in ways I don't want (chiefly in the armholes). I probably will wear it while carrying a backpack or daypack, which will possibly cause some pilling eventually, but I don't wear belts with it --- I realized that a good bit of pilling in my original Sierra dress was caused by belts. Other than those things, though, I don't take particular care, and I definitely wear this dress on an everyday basis, to do whatever I'm doing.
Which, in a moment, is going to be walking the dog again. Meanwhile, I hear the glad sound of the lawnmower. Our neighbors, not to mention the mailman, who has been wading through weeds to the porch every day, will be happy.
AFTERNOON UPDATE:
Lawns are mown, front and back, and look wonderful --- now the flowering things really show up! The bridal-wreath spirea looks particularly gorgeous, now that it's not competing with a meadow of mostly seedheads. I took the pruners and cleared the entry from the street up the front yard --- where I wish we had an actual walkway but don't. All there is, really, is a break in the forsythia, but at least now that's more open and clean.
All my essays for the next week are up: two by me, one by my friend Fr. Robert with a tiny intro by me (and I chose the art and did the formatting). I really would like to get the next week's up, since there are only two, and they're both more or less reruns of old columns from the Sun, but I think I've had it for the day.
Sheets are changed on the bed, bed is made, room is refreshed.
I also decided to resell my Garnet Hill maxi skirt, mostly because it's really gotten too big for me. I keep putting it on, then deciding against it, and that, I think, should tell me something. So that's up in my Poshmark closet --- and I've recovered something from the sale box that I'd been meaning either to put up or donate and not gotten around to it:
Here, in a photo from last year, is this Japanese linen (probably linen-blend) pinafore that has kept coming unsewn at the front slit. I'd mended it, but then the mend started to come apart and look bad. I was going to take it to the seamstress, but never got around to it. Then I was going to move it along, but I never got around to that, either. In the back of my mind, I did always kind of like it --- I just didn't want to mess with it.
Today I retrieved it and resewed the place where the stitching is coming out. I did not do a great job, but it'll hold for a while, and maybe I really will take it to the seamstress and get it done properly. One thing that prompted this was my thought about how I've kept trying to wear my various tops with my green maxi skirt and not liking the outfit somehow --- though I like the tops and want to keep them. It occurred to me then that this is one reason why I like pinafores, actually. They obviate the whole do I tuck it in/do I blouse it/does it look sloppy issue, while still letting you wear a whole rota of these tops. I have worn this pinafore with my pink merino tank, my turquoise silk-cashmere tank, various tees, various dresses-worn-as-tees . . . it goes with everything, and I've worn a lot with it (including this blue tunic that I will never get rid of).
Suddenly it seemed worth bothering with. So I got it out and bothered with it. I've just washed it and hung it outside to dry, and now I have one more neutral thing to wear with purple in these last few days of Lent, without breaking my no-buy out of boredom.
Sometimes I do clearly think: yes, it's time for this thing to go. I believe I've hit this point with the green maxi skirt, much as I have loved it. It's started to feel sloppy, because a little too big, and I haven't liked outfits I've tried to make with it, so clearly it has served its time with me.
But sometimes I really am on the fence, as I was with this pinafore. I might still move it along, someday. Sometimes I go back and forth for literal years over an item --- there was a purple Pact cotton sheath dress that I waffled about for ages, and wore and put away and wore and put away, until finally one day I knew I wouldn't wear it anymore and that was that. I am glad I didn't get rid of this pinafore, though I guess if I had, I would just have shrugged and said, Oh well. But now it's mended and clean and drying, and I can wear it, and this is good.
*I also thought about this pinafore when I was attracted to the Wool& Goldie pinafore. Oh, wouldn't I love to have something like that, I thought, looking at this $150 pinafore. Then I thought, you know, I HAVE something like that, if only I could make myself pull it out and renovate it.
OOH, ALSO:
Tomorrow's liturgical color is red. I always have to remind myself (it's Holy Thursday that's white). So I can do that instead of purple.
AND
Reselling the green maxi skirt will bring me down to one skirt (my red linen-blend skirt is also up for resale), but that's okay. I like my one remaining skirt, my vintage rayon floral maxi, owned now for . . . three years? four? I don't wear it that often, but it's the kind of floral that scratches my "Christy Dawn Dress" itch, a lot more cheaply than an actual Christy Dawn dress would do. I wear skirts so rarely, compared with how often I wear dresses, so it seems silly to have them at all, but I do like that one.
Here I am wearing that skirt in early 2022, which means I bought it in 2021. I was doing a no-buy in 2022, and although I broke that no-buy several times, rather strategically, I didn't break it with secondhand purchases (except that alpaca cardigan Marly talked me into in the fall of 2022 --- she made me do it!).
But I'm really sure I bought this skirt around the same time I bought my bamboo-cotton leggings, in the fall of 2021. So I guess it's in a fourth year of wear, on top of however many years somebody else wore it before it came into my hands.
I do really like that look, now that I revisit it. I should really, truly wear that skirt more often, all year round. I will definitely foreground it as part of my Marian Blue capsule in May. AND it remains a live option for Easter. I've worn it at least twice before on Easter, and I could totally do that again (especially as I'm going to both a Vigil and an Easter Morning Mass).
Anyway, all of this makes the end of my Lenten no-buy a good bit less urgent. I really can take my time about another purchase. It's all fine.
AND AGAIN . . .
Because I'm lying around on the daybed with the dog and feeling kind of brain-dead after all the essays and other writing, and just wanting to think about clothes . . .
Maybe I should make an outfit plan for the week. How about this:
*Palm Sunday: Black Heather Audrey, cranberry-red cardigan, ankle-strap sandals
*Monday (work at home, choir practice in the evening): resurrected Japanese pinafore, Oatmeal NPL tank, purple cardigan, Birks
*Tuesday (Chrism Mass): Marine Blue Fiona, purple cardigan, ankle-strap sandals
*Wednesday (work at home, choir practice in the evening): Grape Wine Smock, purple cardigan, Birks
*Thursday (Holy Thursday dinner at home, Mass): Uhhhh . . . maybe Marine Blue Fiona again, with beige cardigan (maybe longline cardigan for a change) and Papillio Mary shoes
*Friday (Good Friday): Black Heather Audrey, black linen-blend cardigan
*Saturday: Washed Navy Sierra and Birks (daytime)
*Possible Easter Mass outfits (choose 2):
-Cinnamon Rose Leila, pink silk-blend cardigan, ankle-strap sandals
-Emerald Green Smock, pink silk-blend cardigan, ankle-strap sandals
-Dusty Blue NPL tank, blue floral maxi skirt shown above, cobalt merino cardigan OR beige sillk cardigan, ankle-strap sandals
*Easter Monday (party at friends'):
-Cinnamon Rose Leila
-Emerald Green Smock
-Beetroot Brooklyn
-Pacific Brooklyn
Any of those with Birks and a cardigan
VERY much looking forward to a reunion with my favorite clothes!
FINALLY
I am boring myself, but I can't stop. Send help.
Fortunately we're going out soon --- I hear the sound of the shower overhead, as promising in its way as the sound of the lawnmower.
A little date-night/Saturday Vigil Refreshment tweak to the day's outfit:
All I did was switch out my big cardigan coat for this Connemara cardigan, which I realize I won't otherwise get much wear out of between now and next November. It's not really neutral, but eh, it's Saturday night. I'm not ditching my penance, just relaxing it a little. And this is such a nice spring color, in such a lovely warm cardigan, good to wear out on what promises to be a chilly night, a little cold for something like a jean jacket --- but this cardigan is about the same shape as a jean jacket, so it pushes that button nicely.
I wasn't sure how these leggings would play with the two other colors, but they're okay. They're neutral enough not to be a bother, anyhow. At some point, like next fall, I would like to lay my hands on some charcoal-gray leggings --- nice and dark without being black. But these slaty gray-blue ones are good enough for now. I really wish it were warm enough to go bare-legged in my fun sporty little dress, but alas. Another weekend. But this is good. And I'm happy to be going out to Hickory, to the delicious-smelling Olde Hickory Station, with my best beau.